


In The Dark Of Night

by myownknight



Series: Secondhand Agents. [4]
Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV), Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Gen, Undercover, picking up the pieces
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-13
Updated: 2014-11-13
Packaged: 2018-02-25 07:11:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 10,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2612921
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/myownknight/pseuds/myownknight
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the aftermath of the reveal of HYDRA in Captain America The Winter Soldier, SHIELD Agents Katy Morris and Laura Maro are caught overseas with no extraction plan, no safe house, and no way home. There is only one way to for them to go; Deep under cover. </p><p>Getting there will be the tricky part.</p><p>Marvel Big Bang 2014</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tada! here you go folks, Marvel Bang 2013. Mizzy2k has done some AMAZING artwork for this piece that you can see
> 
> [here](http://mizzy2k.livejournal.com/384014.html) 
> 
> , AND a playlist you can download
> 
>  
> 
> [here](https://www.sendspace.com/file/u51ujw)
> 
>  
> 
> . Enjoy!

 

Prologue. In The Dark Of Night.

 

_put that needle on to a record instead of inside your own skin_

_or better yet put it inside your skin first coat it with India Ink_

_but only after it has been properly sterilized._

_sketch on your skin the magic you were hoping to flood your veins with_

_find another kind of magic in creating a permanence with yourself_

_a memory that isn’t washed away by soap and a little hard work._

_take that smoke,_

_the kind that washes the inside of your lungs_

_until you’re light enough to float away_

_from everything you always wished you hadn’t dreamed of,_

_replace it with sage, ash, and myrrh._

_Stain your walls with forgiveness_

_drive out the demons that you’ve left behind along the way._

_Leave behind the soot marks for the next resident to find._

_Maybe they have demons too._

 

 

 

OVER THE SOUTH CHINA SEA NEAR THE RAIU ISLANDS.

 

they were in flight when it happened, assisting rescue efforts in northeastern Malaysia after a hurricane had wash three villages and a SHIELD agent off the face of the map. The cargo hold of the jet might not have had the missing agents remains in it, but it did have 50 soaked to the bones survivors found clinging to wreckage and floating at sea. There were dozens more still in the water, still with the hope of being saved.

 

 

The first sign something was wrong wasn’t when the comms connected the base started shorting out. It was right before that when a perfectly clear image of a death headed octopus replaced the SHIELD insignia screensaver and started laughing. 

 

 

Needless to say, the experience was more then a little disconcerting. 

 

 

“Hail Hydra.” Her copilot Jackson’s response to Laura’s entirely reasonable reaction of “What the fuck?” was accompanied by a goodhearted attempt to stab her in the neck with his standard issue boot knife. Considering the fact that Laura and Katy had had Jackson and his wife Cassidy over for dinner the week before, and that Katy had shopping plans with Cassidy when the mission was over, Laura was less then pleased with this turn of events. Catching his wrist with one hand while she threw the autopilot on and brought the jet to a standstill with the other, Maro decided to go with the wisest course of action, considering the fact that her copilot just went insane and was now trying to kill her

 

 

“Morris?! We have a problem!” 

 

 

From the sounds of it Katy and Jackson’s partner Thomas were a bit preoccupied in the back thanks to the her unexpected slamming on the brakes, but since Laura was at the moment strapped into her chair and somewhat unarmed, calling for backup was the sensible thing to do. 

 

 

Wrestling the knife out of his grip was relatively easy, considering Jackson was as close to failing hand to hand weaponry as you could and still remain an active duty agent, but knocking him out for his own good was slightly harder without the freedom of movement Laura had mostly trained with. Some of SHIELD’s training protocols had covered what to do if your copilot went bonkers in the cockpit, but they had been more along the lines of hallucinating due to blood loss or experiencing traumatic flashbacks or something.

 

 

Finally wrestling her harness off her shoulders, Laura managed to get a firm hold on the back of his head and promptly proceeded to introduce it to the instrument panel in front of them a couple of times, just as Katy slammed through the cockpit door wide-eyed and side arm drawn. She was dripping slightly on the floor, what was hopefully not her blood. 

 

“Are you ok?” Their normally fantastic twin act apparently now extended to crisis reactions as well, a nice touch since they’d never rehearsed this particular scenario.

 

 

“Thomas’s?” If it wasn’t Thomas’s, it was a survivors. Laura wasn’t sure which would be worse.

 

 

“Yes,  I am fine, how are you? Something up with the electronics up here too? And also, did you happen to notice something seems off about our Partners, like the part where they just tried to kill us?” 

 

 

Katy’s typically sarcastic tone had a more then bitter edge in her response. Killing a fellow Agent would do that to a person.

 

 

“ I am fine too. How are our passengers? Think you can give me a hand getting this computer bug fixed so we can call this in ASAP?” Whatever the hell was going on, headquarters needed to know. Getting in contact was now priority, followed by finding somewhere to land so they could discharge their now terrified passengers somewhere marginally safer out of the line of theoretical fire.

 

 

The second sign after of course the initial electronics’ fritz and their compatriots subsequent decent into homicidal mania, was the fact that there was no electronic fritz. Other then the change in screen savers and the fact the channels where all currently flooded with what sounded like the end of the world, the systems where all working damn fine. And someone wanted to know what Thomas’s status was concerning control of the plane. Considering the message opened with something not heard on SHIELDs comm systems ever before, it was cause for concern.

 

 

“Hail Hydra”.

 

 

Well fuck that shit.

 


	2. Chapter One. A Whole New World.

Chapter One. A Whole New World.

 

_Stand up straight smile wide in your fresh pressed clothes_

_just like everyone else around you part of a crowd_

_crowded with people going home alone tonight._

_You’re going to save lives they lied in their posters of paradise_

_no pictures of blood but there will always be so much blood._

 

_I am the huntress and  I am getting my gun._

 

_They promised me a family for just one small fee_

_the chance of a lifetime protecting the free_

_they never told me that families have bigger dues then that_

_that the people at your side may not always have your back._

_My back has been stabbed like twenty times_

_by brothers and sisters when we’re not fighting for our lives_

_but if you get beat up you got to get back up again_

_survival doesn’t matter if you’re focused on the win._

 

_I am the huntress and  I am getting my gun._

 

_Well we all want to be the biggest we all want to be the best_

_to follow pack dynamics you got to beat your chest_

_chase the combat your combat boots beating_

_to beat the rest you can never rest_

_so we shoot at targets not at victims._

 

_I am the huntress and  I am getting my gun._

 

 

WESTERN MALAYSIA. MERSING. TWO DAYS LATER.

 

Landing the jet in Malaysia and attempting to go to ground as a couple of lost college students on a terribly timed spring break after dropping off nearly 80 terrified villagers and two dead bodies in Brunei was harder then it should have been. Fortunately they’d been able to land on the mainland, since access to the rest of Asia would be that much easier with one less conspicuous boat ride between them. Thailand was a reasonably popular tourist destination this time of year, so if they could just cross the border they could fade in and wait for backup. If it ever came.

 

 

Katy’s marvelous plan of growing fat on deep fried noodles and pan seared shrimp for a week was derailed at the first bar they stopped at. Who knew Mersing got BBC.

 

 

Or that something had gone hideously wrong not just with their copilots, but with the rest of SHIELD too. Or perhaps more properly, something had gone very right for Hydra.

 

 

Hundreds were dead. The Helicarriers were down. Every last file had be released out into the world. Anyone with the slightest inclination now knew about Agent Stewart’s milk intolerance, Mandy at the front desk’s Mother’s bypass surgery, the restraining order Agent Giano had against their ex, everything. Every single cover ID, every black op, patch job, humanitarian rescue, political manipulation, everything. Even the security footage inside the buildings, should anyone care to watch seven thousand hours of the analysts on the third floor in New York mainlining coffee and working nonstop after the New York Incident.

 

 

Every personnel file. Including theirs. All out there. All being perused, read, and torn apart for evidence. 

 

 

Reddit was having a field day with it. Laura’s Mum was probably having a heart attack. In all honesty Laura looked close to a heart attack, by which she meant Laura looked mildly constipated, while Katy was likely red faced and sweating like a motherfucker. A glance in the nearest mirror would probably confirm that they looked about as far from casually blending tourists as humanly possible for a person to be. The locals were definitely pointedly ignoring them, it couldn’t possibly be they had better things to to then stare at two dumbass tourist’s stuck in traffic.

 

 

Though their choice in transportation was definitely a plus in this situation. The some what still pale blue VW Bug had definitely seen better days, perhaps back in the 80’s, but it was running, and looked just as rusted and homely as every other car packed on this ridiculous dirt road. The owner had been more then happy to hand it off in exchange for a fistful of American money, that in all honesty was mostly crumpled ones and fives left in the bottom of Katy’s backpack from the last time they went bar hopping and needed tip money.

 

 

Katy took her turn inching along the crowded interstate while Laura dozed in the passengers seat, occasionally playing with a replica Kodak she’d picked up somewhere, taking pictures of the lazy winding river to their left, and the crowded market streets around them; the muggy heat becoming slowly more oppressive as they moved father inland away from the salty ocean breeze that flavored the coastal regions.

 

 

With one last glance at Laura, Katy pulled her ball cap a little farther down and stared back out into the teeming mass of people shouting, laughing, crying, and carrying on with their general existence as if the whole world wasn’t falling apart. After all, people would always need clean clothes and fresh eggs, would always, in some form or another, pay what they could for some small bit of happiness. Even if it was something as simple as a fresh orange, or a hat from someone’s favorite baseball team nine thousand miles farther from home then they had ever meant to be.

 

 

In what passed for a backseat, the pile of blankets crammed in next to what gear they had be able to salvage from the jet, shifted slightly and groaned. Agent Coren carefully shifted his head out of his cocoon of safety and blinked rather reptilian-ly at the chaotic swirl of color, noise, and smells surrounding them. Between the haphazard cast on his arm, and the disgustingly colored Hawaiian shirt Laura had managed to helpfully procure for him, all is took was a pair of slightly cracked glasses and he couldn’t look more like a clueless academic sidekick in an Indiana Jones movie if he tried.

 

 

“How are we doing?” Derek Coren coughed rather dryly as he dug a lukewarm water out of the miniature leaky cooler they had managed to cram between the two front seats. It held a handful of water bottles, Coren’s stash of black-market antibiotics he was suppose to be taking and wasn’t, and about a quarter of a pound of C4 and two extra clips that Katy had shoved in there for lack of a better place to store them. The cold wouldn’t be the best for it in the long term, but it had to better then letting it sit out in weather that was slowly and predictably climbing once again into the low 90’s. 

 

 

Katy glanced at the speedometer. “middling around fifteen to twenty when we get lucky, but we should be out of the city in an hour or two, and that’ll help. How’s the arm?”

 

 

Coren grimaced reflexively. “It is fine. Not my first broken arm, but what would you know it feel new every time. It is not getting worse though, I think that doc did a pretty good job wrapping it up. I didn’t know you spoke Malaysian, where did you learn it?” Laura cracked up from the passengers seat, cackling softly as Katy loftily ignored her.

 

 

“I don’t speak Malaysian. There’s uh, there’s an app for that.”

 

 

“Oh.” The mostly silence after that wasn’t all that more awkward then it had been in the first place. Coren’s presence, the way he moved, the way he took up space, had been awkward from the minute they had pulled him out of the water, held a gun to his head, and asked him if he was Hydra. 

 

 

Some people just have a hard time letting some things go.


	3. Chapter Two There Can Be Miracles.

Chapter Two There Can Be Miracles.

When she swings swings hard it is hard to remember  
why she’s swinging those fists in the first place at all  
bright lights to the right thick walls to the left   
all thats left is the meaning of bruised and raw  
better her than her sisters better her than her brothers  
so she swing’s left, swing’s right, swing’s on.

MALAYSIA. NORTHERN BORDER.

Laura fought with the stuck window at a small hostel just inside the border, trying to shut out the rain that splashed most inconveniently against the window sill and brought a strangely chilly wind with it. out side the rain pooled in dips on the dirt sidewalks and in the cracks of the miniature parking lot behind their window, while inside the Agents began the laborious process of attempting to get both dry and clean before bunking down for the night. 

 

Laura had elected to take first watch, so Coren got first dibs on the small and leaky bathroom, while Katy began striping down and cleaning her sidearm. The familiar scent of gun oil overlaid with the miniature bottle of Katy’s dry shampoo, was one Laura had been smelling for the past decade, and for a moment made this borrowed room feel almost like home.

 

If they could ever go home. Home was neighboring two bedroom apartments a twenty minute walk or five minute drive from SHIELD’s secondary east coast headquarters in Boston. Addresses that were now splashed across the internet, along with everything SHIELD had ever gathered on either of them. Home might not be so safe anymore. Even if they were capable of going back.

 

To be honest, Katy wasn’t sure they would even go back stateside. But Laura was certain there must be some people still left from SHIELD that were good, that it was only a matter of time before they got in contact and brought them home. Laura had faith, and Katy was not going to be the one that took it away.

 

Laura’s faith was the only reason she was still alive at least three times over after all. Maybe it would work just this one more time again.

 

“Anything out there?” Katy inquired, smoothly reassembling her sidearm after her cursory inspection and cleaning. Getting it truly clean could take hours, and having one of their few weapons out of commission for that long in an unsecured location was not going to cut it. Until they to somewhere where they didn’t share their walls with a couple having sex on one side, and some rowdy teens getting high on the other, a quick wipe down would have to suffice. At this rate they wouldn’t be able to hear a tank coming, let alone any rogue agents that may be after them.

 

“A few lost ducks that I am pretty sure are trying to swim in the parking lot, but other then that not much. How are you holding up?” Katy glanced up briefly, her gaze flicking over Laura faster then she usually would. Katy was generally more the kind to stare when she talked.

 

“I’ll adapt. What do you think of our lovely traveling companion? He on the up and up?”

Well I’ve never worked with Agent Coren before” Laura admitted, moving further away from her perch on the windowsill and closer to her partner. The sputtering drum of water from the bathroom hadn’t slowed yet, so they had at least a few more moment of relative privacy. “But he seems genuinely sincere in his surprise, and hasn’t tried to spilt us up or pry too much into us, so I am inclined to wait a bit more before we slit his throat and dump him on the side of the road.”

 

Katy rolled her eyes at Laura’s classically droll jab, stating, “ I am not gonna kill him if. I. don’t. have. to.” the silent clicks of her reloading one of the backup magazines empathizing her words. Maro and Morris had started carrying interchangeable magazines years before, after differing preferences in sidearms led to Katy almost getting her head blown off while Maro was pinned down and unable to return fire.

 

“Either way, keep me in the loop. I’d rather help you hide the body, since everyone know’s you’re shit at hiding anyway.” The empty ammo box Katy chucked at Laura’s head wasn’t exactly a surprise. “God, you just can’t let that go, can you? That was nine fucking years ago! I was a kid.”

 

“And it is still the reason why no one ever believes us when we tell them you’re our secondary sniper.” 

 

Coren emerged from the now oppressively steamy bathroom just in time to catch the tail end of Laura’s tease, and haltered slightly in his footsteps, unsure of how to take the until now laconic Agent’s remark. Laura elected to loftily ignore him as she returned to her great performance masterpiece she liked to call ‘Agent Melinda May Staring Out A Window Thinking About Assassinating Everyone’. She had of course, learned it from the best. Katy shot past Coren as soon as the gap between him and the door was just barely big enough, shooting over her shoulder in passing “I swear to god there had better be some hot water left or there will be hell to pay. You’re on next watch after Laura, I’ll take the morning shift.”

 

“Okay?…” Katy hadn’t bothered to wait for his response, which was addressed towards the general vicinity of the now firmly closed bathroom door. 

 

Agent Coren took up a spot on one of the beds, unconsciously mirroring Morris’s position only moments before, as he attempted unholstered and clear his weapon one handed, before beginning the process of dismantling it. Laura stared out the window continuing her vigil, toying softly with a small smooth stone she had found in the parking lot after checking in to what passed for a front desk here. At home, on a high shelf beside the only window in the apartment that ever seemed to get sun, a small pile of neatly stack stones sat beside a stack of worn novels and a snow globe from Winnipeg, Canada. 

If they could return, when they returned, this one would make a nice addition. One more story so classified she would never be able to tell it, even if the details were splashed across every front page in America. Even if she didn’t make it. 

Perhaps especially if she didn’t.

 

Ironic, almost, that she’d find the perfect fit to her collection nine thousand miles away from where she kept it. Stones had a way of traveling of course, but this one would have a long road ahead of its next resting place. They all did.


	4. Chapter Three. God Help The Outcasts.

Chapter Three. God Help The Outcasts.

We carry stories that are not our own  
etched in to the very center of what it means to us  
to be a women…  
…Where you listening when she told you no  
where you listening when I told you go?  
What part of being a women means having to remember  
the parables that all men carry underneath their skin?

 

BANGKOK, THAILAND.

 

Electing to use the Inner Maylasian freeways to cut over to the connecting route with Thailand's biggest highway had added a few hours none of them were too happy about to the trip, but once they had crossed to border on the strength of their American Passports and solidly decent southern accents, the time more then made up for its self in convenience. The unrest meant more border patrols, and more stringent security checks, but a couple of lost american’s were the least of their worries with the treat of bombers and civil unrest slowly looming on Thailand’s horizons. Laura was even convinced to finally let Coren and his stupid broken arm take a shift at the wheel, since it didn’t get much more basic then “follow the signs with the fucking 4 on them, and wake me when we get to Bangkok.”

 

To be honest, even Katy could be trusted to follow those directions, and she once ended up in Pennsylvania when she was trying to get to Maine for a family reunion. Although looking back, there was the slightest possibility that had in fact not been an accident. She maintained even the idea of an entire weekend of being constantly asked why she didn’t talk about work and why she hadn’t found a nice girl to get settled down with yet wasn’t bad enough to make her willingly go to Pennsylvania. After all, who knew how long cows could hold a grudge, and Katy was not going to be the first to volunteer for that particular little experiment. Getting chased once was more then enough.

 

After all, it wasn’t even like the slurpies had been her idea in the first place. Honest.

 

Never the less, Bangkok looked to be the perfect place to be. Sometimes known as the Backpacking center of the world, between the ten million roughly permanent residents and the countless visitors, most of them semi intoxicated and speaking english while throwing around either daddies money, or an entire year’s salary on the trip of their life, three more people would hardly be noticed.

 

To be fair they were on the older side to be taken as hitchhikers. Coren was nearing forty, and while Katy at thirty two could almost pass for a senior in college, Laura was not the kind to have cultivated a youthful look, and looked every bit of her thirty five hard earned years. At least she’d learned how to ditch her home grown accent years earlier, so questions wouldn’t arise as to why a Brit and a Yank were wandering around snooping. Americans always came through and snooped, so two were much less conspicuous. 

 

After a bit of discussion and vicious arguing, Coren and Laura became an Electrician and a Secretary on a budget honeymoon, and Laura magically developed a post- Art History degree life crisis. Coren wasn’t exactly the happiest with what he perceived to be some ridiculously flimsy covers. 

 

“Look, its a good cover, statistically speaking these jobs would put us in a tax bracket where traveling around the world hitch hiking as our honeymoon to save money for a down payment on a house is financially solid, and very believable at our ages. We’d be somewhat settled in our respective fields, though not experts and not tied down by children. And Katy’s cover is the perfect accompaniment, if we met her at a hostel its likely she’d tag along for awhile if the trip sounded fun, and its practically a rite of passage for people to wander about a bit, find themselves before settling down. You’re being ridiculous, we should stick to the plan.” 

 

For once Laura had dropped her public face of silence. Her iron backbone and quick temper only showed when Katy wasn’t doing what she did best and hogged the limelight. Katy, was currently sitting on the steps of their motel room chain smoking some questionable local brand of cigarettes in an attempt to stop herself from strangling Coren. She’d argued with him for over a half an hour before Laura stepped in.

 

Coren, in all his wisdom, decided to loftily ignore what was technically his supervising agent and continue to bicker about the covers in Katy’s general direction, as if further antagonizing her would somehow make him any more right, or any less of a douchebag.

 

“I know absolutely nothing about electrical workings, and quite frankly I’d be surprised if your partner little Miss Ice Queen here could crack her tiny shell long enough to put on a convincing show! I am a level 5 agent, I have been with SHIELD since they recruited me straight out of the academy, and I know damn well where you come from. We may not have met, but every one knows the story of poor Maro and Morris, a pair of too big fuck-ups to even be trusted in the real world. For gods sake you let yourselves be kidnapped before you even finished training. How can I trust that you aren’t Hydra or working for the Russians! 

 

“Before SHIELD took pity on you, you didn’t have even the slightest bit of training, and quite frankly Maro it is a tragedy they discarded perfectly good agents with previous experience in their decision to teach some little former secretary how to fly. You should never have been let near the cockpit of a plane, and after having to endure your little poor excuse for a rescue, I would have to agree! And you, Morris.” he sneered, obviously done bidding his time and sossing them out. 

 

“You never even finished any kind a dredge, pathetic really, when you think about it. Precious Coulson with his special exceptions probably got you in, every one knows he’s a bleeding heart for sob stories like your poor little sister.

 

“Now we are not going to go with your little bullshit fantasy of a cover, we are going to follow SHIELD standard protocol and move to the nearest safe house. Ms. Maro can pass as a near local if she can keep her little mouth shut and head down, and you and I will be traveling on business. Once this whole Hydra thing is sorted out, someone should be in contact to pull us out of this god forsaken crap hole of the third world country for good. 

 

“If you’re lucky, I won’t include this little ridiculous attempt at authority in my report. It was all well in good in country during what was clearly your mission, I respect that. But now I am out of danger, and that means as senior field agent with the most experience, I’ll be taking lead, since clearly neither of you have any respect for protocol. It is no wonder Hydra managed to infiltrate us if everyone took it as cavalierly as you two so obviously do.”

 

Katy’s shoulders tensed ever so slightly as she took a final drag from the crumbling butt of what appeared to be her sixth cigarette after four years dry. Laura just stood there and stared at the red faced idiot of a man who was currently trying to puff himself up, as if looking taller would make his dick any longer. 

 

It was a surprise to precisely just one person in the room that the agent with the biggest reputation for being volatile just sat there stone faced as her polite partner throat punched one of the last uncompromised SHIELD Agents left in the universe. And then walked away.

 

He should have seen it coming. Katy proceeded to stub out her cigarette, collect what little gear they had unpacked from the car before the argument began, and walk back out again without a word to the shocked silent Agent, joining her partner currently leaning against the rusted but trust VW, picking idly at a callus as she waited. A handful of items were pulled from the car, what few items Coren had had on him at the time of his rescue, and what amounted to a standard emergency kit of a foil blanket, a few MREs, an extra clip for his side arm, and a basic first aid. Those were left on the ground outside the still open motel door.

 

Laura elected to drive. Katy let her.

 

Their new motto ought to be trust no one. Especially those claiming to be on their side. Coren had shown himself to be too volatile and pigheaded to be trusted now. “Are we going to kill him? He could be a danger if he’s caught.” Katy watched Laura impassively, waiting for her reply.

 

“No. We can’t. There’s still rules, we still have to follow the big ones. No deaths unwarranted. No crimes undocumented. We do this clean, and as legal as we can manage. See if we can get by.”


	5. Chapter Four. Strangers Like Me.

Chapter Four. Strangers Like Me.

 

_you drink it down another pill to eat_

_say swallowed propaganda tastes so sweet_

_I close my eyes everyone is blind_

_and I die._

 

_murder, mayhem, we get them all the time._

_Confusion, chaos, excitement so sublime_

_We shout and scream though none can hear and then go home_

_and have another beer…_

 

 

Bangkok was bustling in the early morning air, the smoke clouded bright neon lights that marked much of the worlds perception of it were markedly absent, as businessmen left for work, and students headed for schools of all levels within the city limits, easily navigating the almost intuitive transit system. After having fought with train systems from Washington DC, to Seoul, even Katy could could handle the small problem of most of the signs being in a language she neither spoke nor read. After all whatever the problem was, there was probably an app for that. 

 

 

If all went well, in a week they would be out of here, and inbound to Australia on the cheapest round trip tickets they could find. Their IDs were not the best, having elected to avoid a pitstop at any SHIELD safe houses and instead venture into the black-market and pay far too much for being a foreign risk, but they might be enough to get them into Australia if all went well. Laura was busy taking her shift on the one bed they have rented to share in a cheery ramshackle student hostel, having spent much of the night and part of the evening wandering the city’s infamous night markets, trying to see if she could learn enough of the language and local accent in time to convince Australian Customs she was a local sightseer. With the rise in unrest, especially at the border, and with the sweeping legal changes Thailand was considering, hopefully they would be more concerned with if she was a commercial surrogate coming in to meet a potential customer.

 

 

The room was smaller then they would have liked, three bunk beds crammed into a room intended really for only a single twin, and most of the beds occupied on and off by both foreign tourists’s, and local students and kids in need of a safe and relatively cheap place to crash for the night. Between the sickly pale green wallpaper, the gently flapping strips of fly catchers dangling from the corners of the ceiling, and the suspiciously crunchy carpet that was mostly non visible in the dim and flickering overhead light bulb, it wasn’t exactly the Grand Prix. The only window faced a dingy concrete wall from the privacy fence around the next door apartment building, and the door only locked if you shoved it very firmly with a shoulder and a hip while scrambling to slid the lock into place before it slipped out of alignment again.

 

 

It also took cash payments, did not require one to surrender a form of id at check in, and have a tv playing soap opera reruns 24 hours a day in the small common room lounge. It wasn’t in the best part of town, but it also wasn’t in the worst, and based of the characters that hung around outside of the building, Laura would bet her two best rifles that their new landlady was the mother of at least one of the local gang members, if not half of the low level drug runners in the city. It was perfect. Staying here, was about as far as they could get from the middle class innocuous apartment halfway across the city that awaited them with clean drinking waters, changes of id, and a secure link directly to the Helicarriers, or what was left of it. It was also probably teeming with Hydra Agents awaiting their resurface, if that Idiot Coren hadn’t already called in a retrieval and gotten his head shot off yet. Morris privately agreed that she wasn’t sure which was she was hoping either.

 

 

Katy, for her part, was doing her best to develop her lost Canadian routine. Her slight undertone of nervousness for some reason seemed to be selling it rather well to the local shopkeepers she had chatted with, many opening up freely about their concerns about rioting, insufficient business, and what the unrest was likely to do to the next tourist season. Already there were fewer partying it up then usual, many opting to pay slightly more over the border for a slightly better chance of not needing to flee to their nearest embassy if war broke out. As with most places, explaining she wasn’t American and then nodding amicably as they complained about entitled tourists was an easy way to endear herself without remaining memorable enough to miss.

 

 

“Oh, this is great! Do you have it in See Kee Oh, in green? or maybe blue, um, in Seefa? I love the detailing, it is exquisite!” Morris babbled away, absent mindedly gushing over some admittedly fine needle work on a scarf, as she once again scanned what of the crowd she could see in her peripheral vision for anything out of place. With her luck, this lovely old women who looked like she was going to faint with joy every time Katy tried out a new stumbling Thai word, was secretly a Hydra agent sent to assassinate her with one of the many scarves in this stall. Or maybe she was just someone’s grandmother looking to make a buck selling traditional embroidery while the young favored imported western crap. Kids these days.

 

 

The grandmother rustled for a minute, and came up with a scarf similar to the red one that she had found. This one instead was stitched blue and green swirls, a pattern repeating endlessly across it and neatly sewn off with black hems. Katy indicated she’d take it, along with another she’d found in green and red fabric, a traditional block pattern sewn in white down the middle. 

 

 

“Cohw Cop Newun!” she thanked the seller with a smile, screwing her face up in good humor at her own bad and obviously thick accent. The seller, with a laugh, waved her off good naturedly, after telling her one more time in quite clear english to come back if she found herself in such need for a husband that she’d consider the women’s good for nothing grandson, who apparently spent all day playing video games and none of it doing his schoolwork. Katy promised to think about it, before she headed back out into the twisting ribbons of humanity flowing through the pleasantly busy morning market place. Here in one of the slightly older sections of town, the common street vendor was king, and the sidewalks looked more like your average rummage sale meets farmers market then it did the capital of an entire country. It was amazing. It was the perfect place to disappear.

 

 

Looking at the still vibrant and busy city, it was hard to see the echoes of the civil war brewing at the country’s borders, but it was there. Just a few more law enforcement officers lingered in strategic places, some tempers just a little bit sharper, and prices lingering on the edge of inflation. War has its toll, even hundreds of miles away.

 

 

Katy still had a few more hours, with the sun high in the sky and Laura likely still fast asleep in the slightly cooler dark of their hostel bunk. They’d chosen to take a top bunk for the sake of marginally harder access, and a tiny bit more privacy, which had paid off well. The young girl that had rented the bunk below them was a friendly sociology student from Texas, who’d managed to convince her parents that this was purely a trip to gather material for her thesis, and was thus spending most of her time checking out the local attractions and volunteering at a local shelter instead of in the room.

 

 

With the markets exhausted of interesting things to look at for the moment, Katy moved on to what was rapidly becoming one of her favorite places in the city;A community center. Air Conditioned and open to the public, it was a little odd for a tourist to be hanging out in, but as long as she stayed mostly in the adjacent library and tried to work her way through a book or two, she was left be to enjoy the quiet that was only broken by the giggles and chatter of children dropped off by parents to keep them out of trouble for a few hours after a school while they picked up dry cleaning and groceries.

 

 

Entering the Center, Katy was greeted by a blast of blissfully cool air and a vague smile in her direction by the young man on duty behind the front counter, who ignored her in favor of whatever social media site was currently all the rage among disaffected youngsters. Kids these days. Between the tall shelves stuffed with paperbacks and wilting cookbooks, and the low cubicles filled with teens and adults like surfing the internet on secondhand monitors and laptops, the center was filled to near capacity and was an absolute nightmare of sight-lines and potential threats. She loved it.

 

 

Picking her way between filled seats and grumpy patrons, she eased her way down into an empty creaky seat undoubtedly salvaged from some abandoned office building, and picked up a crumpled and ear marked magazine. Time to find out who wore that hideous pink monstrosity best to the awards show. 

 

 

Sometimes undercover had it is perks. Indulging in the occasional manicure and fluff magazine almost made up for the whole people were likely coming after them. Almost. If it didn’t mean losing every friend she had made in the last near decade, and that every questionable decision, every trigger she had ever pulled was currently being trawled across the internet and pulled apart looking for a reason to condemn her and her brothers and sisters in arms. 

 

 

If she could still go home at the end of the day, this would all be worth it. It had to be. She didn’t really have anything but SHIELD left to lose. Without Laura, without Alex, Lawrence, Without the dozens of agents she’d put her lives in the hands of countless times… What was it worth it if they would as soon stab her in the eye then give her a hand.

 

 

When this was all over, she was going to need so much therapy. And there was definitely going to be a waiting line. Even now,… what Laura had suggested the night before suggesting was breaking her heart in a way.

 

 

“We need to split up. Two SHIELD Agents in one country will be bad enough, in the same city? Even worse. If we stay together, we’re a bigger target Katy, and you know that. Once we get to Sydney, we need to disappear, and I don’t know how we’re going to do that together.”

 

 

Splitting up was never the plan. But SHIELD falling apart had never been the plan either. And that look in Laura’s eyes… It was fear, plan and simple. First time she’d seen it there in years, since they where just two dumb rookies caught up in someone else’s mess in Eastern Europe with nothing but a stolen car and a couple of QSW’s for their trouble.

 

 

Katy sniffled inconspicuously, and adjusted the way she was clenching her magazine too tight. Partner’s didn’t split up. It was just that simple in her mind.

 

 

Laura saw it differently.

 


	6. Chapter Five. I’ve Got A Dream.

Chapter Five. I’ve Got A Dream.

AUSTRALIA. NEW SOUTH WALES.

 

_We’re slow dancing_

_under the moon_

_you’re_

_tuesday’s child_

_in monday’s_

_shoes_

_we_

_shouldn’t be_

_together_

_but_

_can’t be apart_

_you_

_are all I need to_

_hold in the_

_dark._

 

 

Picture this. A warehouse sized building, over exposed through a combination of excessive skylights and florescent lightbulbs. Upwards of a thousand people constantly streaming through the doors and cueing up in anticipation of checking to see if their names are on the right lists. And less then a hundred of them at any moment likely to be your cover.

 

 

Welcome to Sydney Airport, Australia.

 

 

Taking the same flight and booking seats near each other was a rookie risk, and they damn well knew it. But between the shit still going down every couple of days on tv, and the desire just to get the hell out of dodge, having each other’s backs one was more important to Katy, and had been worth the fight to her. Now Laura stood back and waited, one of several dozen people waiting to make their way’s through customs, with Katy barely visible in the line in front of her, where through the thoroughly ruthless application of elbows she’d managed to wedge her self in to the first few people off the plane. Morris wasn’t exactly a happy flier, even if she handled her self well enough on planes. Some thing about hurtling through the sky thousands of feet above the ground in a glorified tin can with hair dryers strapped to the sides didn’t exactly appeal to her. Maro didn’t get it. What wasn’t to love?

 

 

“Hi, how are you? Here you go.” handing off her passport, Katy, or as she was going right now Sofie Annecston, sounded like an old pro at travel. As a Canadian tourist who’s passport indicated she’d been to Peru, England, and America, of course she kind of was at this point. Australia was just another country to visit at this point.

 

 

Immigration Control and Customs were both less then cordial, much like most officials around the world. The prospect that the hot blonde might be smuggling something dangerous made it kind of hard to fall for the old push up bra trick. Begnin tired traveler was less likely to unfortunately catch the eye, and keeping their shoulders relaxed a good way to avoid tripping the cam software searching for dangerous behavior.

 

 

Fortunately it was true about Canadian’s universal good report. Katy would be worse about mimicking them if it’d been possible to go as any one else, but when it came to passports you took what you could get. Besides, she wasn’t going to do anything too horrible to besmirch their collective name.

 

 

She hoped.

 

 

Immigrations was in some ways less stressful then being crammed into a plane for over five hours wondering if there were people awaiting them with death warrants on their awhile. Even just looking around at the tired families and business people surrounding Laura, it was hard to believe that they’d made it this far. That SHIELD hadn’t caught them yet. Granted, they weren’t going to be first on the list by a long shot, but they were good at what they did, and their files had reflected that. Clean up’s and rescue were important work. Sooner or later, Hydra would come, and a question may be posed to which no one would like the answer.

 

 

Sydney was.. Refreshing. The cool summer months were a blessing, the scarf Katy had mutely thrust at her before they left their dim light hostel room in Thailand for the last time was perfect for keeping back the light winds that crept between the tall buildings, bringing the slightest hint of salt with it, so very different from the thick and humid feel that clung to the air in Thailand on occasion just a few hundred miles away.

 

 

Stepping out from between the tall glass doors that separated the airport from the bustling sidewalk just out side, Laura cast a glance to her right, her left, and then moved with a purpose. Now, it was time to blend in, and make some new friends. A cruise downtown and through what ever unsavory parts of town that Sydney held should suffice to make a few introductions. Time to blend in, and disappear, and there was no better way o do that then to join a population that already wanted to disappear.

 

 

No looking back. No looking for Katy. It was better this way, less dangerous, and they both knew it even if Katy couldn’t admit it.

 

 

No looking back. Ever.

 

 

With softly rounded shoulders and a mild smile on her face, Laura strode out into the bright sunlight.

 

 

 

THREE MONTHS LATER. SYDNEY WAREHOUSE DISTRICT.

 

 

 

Laura timed her entrance with the exit of a raucous and drunk party of young gang officers and their girls and guys, slipping in while they struggled on coats, searched for keys, and called for missing comrades. Inside, fortunately, the relatively low lighting and dense smoke meant one more plain solemn faced girl hardly made a dent in the collective consciousness of the rooms occupants. Music from the top forties to old rock and roll blasted over the hot-wired speakers, while patrons sprawled across tables, cheated at cards, and a few more adventurous ones writhed more or less discretely in the shadowed corners and on the minuscule dance floor. The building was obviously converted, one of the few that appeared to have survived the cities multiple sweeps for unlicensed businesses, meaning her path to the barkeep was tight and winding, and scarcely added by the abandoned serving tray she had snagged on her way past the neglected coat check that judging by the smell of it was on occasion a makeshift lavatory.

 

 

The bar was being serviced by a frazzled young women and an older man, both serving what alcohol they offered at whirling spends to keep up with the impatient demands of the tables nearest them. The young women was likely either a relative or a love level member, paying her dues by keeping her head down and moping up spills. Her dark red bob was caught back in a messy knot that was likely more the result of a long shift then any particular desire to look stylishly unkept in her jeans and a low cut tee uniform. The old man was cut tall and lean, flat black hair extending down just far enough to tap the rim of his well used glasses. Tommy was always on the move, always working, and it showed in how his business thrived.

 

 

Getting Tommy’s attention was a job in and over itself, one she finally solved by snagging a discarded serving tray, shoving half a dozen abandoned empty glasses on it, and wiggling her way impatiently past the distracted customers and behind the bar with a soft “excuse me” to the redheaded women working that half. She let her by without comment and merely a cocked head towards Tommy’s turned back before she went back to pulling beers and cleaning up spills with experienced ease. 

 

 

"Hey hey, Big Girl, Big World, glad too see you're back! what's up, how are you doing?" Tommy's face  is all sunshine and open thoughts, so open even a child could read him. It is amazing what one got away with when people thought every emotion you had could be read in your body language. The local shifts didn't even bother to bother him anymore beyond his usual 'security' fee, so confident they were in his honesty. No better way to move shit fast, then the back room of an honest mans home.

 

 

"Hi, Dude, good to see you to. Just got finished up with a gig down the block so I was hoping to see if you had any chores lying around, I could use the quick cash." Straight forward and honest, only way to go. Tommy didn't care if you had an ulterior motive, just a long as you told him about it. Pretending she was just here to catch up, could ruin over a month’s work building a base of trust and reliability with him, and with an economy like this one you can not afford to go walking around screwing over your partners every chance you get. Of course total honesty did not work with anyone but Tommy and was likely to get you kicked out or worse in a lot of parts of the city, but adaptation for survival is one thing Laura had learned all too well growing up. 

 

 

Tommy brightened up at the prospect of working with her again. Laura had already proven she did good work, not the fastest or the most cunning, but what she do have was reliability and had a healthy sense of her own mortality. It only took a few more half hearted insistences on her part before he 'relented' and practically dragged Maro back to the back room, where his pride and joy, a hulking rebuilt iron cutter lurked, neatly hiding in the shadows the doorway to the back, back room. Tommy's second job, and home away from home.

 

 

Beside the neatly made up pallet on the floor, shelves covered every wall from floor to ceiling, filled with covered boxes made of every material, and carefully labeled and categorized in Tommy's unreadable handwriting. Who needs a code when you could just make english untranslatable?

 

 

Tommy was on a roll, chattering cheerfully about the uptake in prices on olives, of all things, since the last round of import and open market restrictions had been rolled out. Every month it seemed, it was harder to buy, get, or keep one thing or another, and apparently for some unknown reason, this month it was olives. Of course as soon as you told some one they expressly couldn't have this one thing, every one developed a deep and driving need for one. Tommy's ‘stationary’ supplier was doing good business this quarter, a good bit of it even in cash instead of trade or intangibles. 

 

 

Laura was pretty low on the totem pole, having introduced herself in the underground scene as a low level party girl, looking to run errands and trade favors to supplement her party habits. As far as the Australian Government was concerned, she was Lisa Morency, on a travel visa who volunteered at a local food bank in exchange for meals on occasion. Down here, she was just Lisa, moral ambivalence and casual attitude in one. Working her way up would take time, and sooner rather then later she’d have to declare an allegiance if she wanted to make a career out of this. She was still deciding.

 

 

"All right Love, here ya, go, you got the route down? Know where you are going?" Tommy checked one last time, running over the scant paperwork that held the bare minimum he required to sign the papers into her care with out potentially implicating either of them.Tommy needed her to run some supply requests down to his alcohol supplier in person,just in case the brass was sniffing around again.

 

 

 "All set, got it all down up here" Laura told him, tapping the crown of her head. 

"No need to go broadcasting it to any twit that tries to pick my pocket. How long do I have?" 

 

Tommy's fingers absentmindedly waved as he did the calculations. 

 

"hmm, can you make it before lights out? My supplier can get a head start on the morning traffic if you can swing it, but I would understand if you did not want to hop that many Sectors your first morning off the Block, sets a bad trend and all."

 

Laura didn’t even blink.

 

“Sure Tommy, whatever you want. You’re the boss”. The former SHIELD Agent turned and wove her way back through the crowded seedy bar, not pausing to look back.

 

 

Across town, just outside the Admissions Office of Sydney Community College, a figure slipped out from the closing doors, calling out one last thanks as the office closed for the day. The recently hired part time receptionist Kara Masters, had just signed up to take some introductory programming classes, and the other office workers had gotten her a card and a cupcake to celebrate one of their own reaching for the higher education they peddled so ernestly on a daily basis.  

 

 

Katy stopped at the edge of the sidewalk to wait for her bus, and absently brushed her hair back. The extensions were taking some getting use too, but suddenly longer hair was a better disguise then the ubiquitus chopping it all off, and after a half a lifetime of one type or another of long bobs that were convenient, the long, flowy, and occasionally annoying layers were kind of nice. Very in right now, and definitely not practical.

 

 

Something long term unpractical was kind of nice these days. Her Cover had come together quickly, Kara Masters rising out of bits and pieces of her old civillian cover, and from her brief days at college. It was kind of nice, actually fully living a cover, without trying to remember every night what her missions was, or what is was that she loved that her cover hated. What Katy loved, Kara loved. Kara could maybe even do what Katy hadn’t had time, or energy, or clearance for, in years… Life as a Clearance Agent sucked. It was Moderate risk, unforgiving hours, thankless tasks cleaning up the aftermaths of other agent’s messes and bloody missions. No one thanked the agents that got ordered to go in the day after an assasination and systematically destroy the blood splatter patterns at the scene of the crime to better cover the shooters tracks, and no one wanted to wait at home for someone who disapeared for weeks at a time, and came back smelling like bleach and mud and exhaust, with no good explanation why. Dating as an Agent outside of SHIELD had been hard, and it had been easier to casually date agents in other divisions, and develop family strong bonds with her teammaters instead. In a way, SHIELD had become her family. At least until the man she had considered practically a brother had calmly tried to kill her four months earlier.

 

 

Katy still had trust issues. Katy, still missed her partner, and was still angry at Laura for splitting, and at SHIELD for betraying them, and vaguely worried about the parents that she hadn’t spoken to in years, and about her old college roommate that would be sitting down all alone at a reunion party thousands of miles away in just a few days, wondering what happened to an old friend. But Kara… Kara seemed like the kind of girl that might be looking to settle down. Buy an apartment. It would be nice to find out.

 

 

With a honk and a wheezing gasp, the four ten bus to Northmead trundled up to the bus stop. Kara Masters collected her messenger bag and dangling her empty coffee mug off two fingers, trotted up the short steps, blissfully unware of any problems in the world, in the eyes of any one why may happen to be watching.

 

 

No one was.

 

 

In the warehouse district, one former SHIELD agent commited a class 2 felony by becoming an accomplice to two counts of drug smuggling, and one count of misdemenor possesion of smuggled alcohol. In a middle class suburb just a few miles away, another former SHIELD agent nudged her percolator to get it to brew coffee faster, and flipped the radio on to listen to the evening news while her coffee brewed and some leftovers began to gently heat up in the tiny oven her in law apartment had come with. The only thing in common their shared past and the matching throwing knives strapped to their backes beneath a tattered black tank top and a soft button up blouse, respectively.

 

 

Somethings never change.

 


	7. Chapter Six. Ever Ever After.

Chapter Six: Ever Ever After.

_…_

_Sometimes_

_ships go down_

_sinking slowly till they touch the ground_

_the bones of my sailors won’t leave any trace_

_beneath these waters I’m finally safe._

 

_I wish I could unfurl all of my sails_

_fly away without any cares_

_lay above you as we seek the unknown_

_but until then I’ll reap what I sow._

 

_I wish you were water that I could breathe in_

_you’d fill my lungs until I couldn’t swim_

_completely surround me in place of the air_

_until I am yours and forever sleep here._

 

TWO MONTHS LATER. NORTHMEAD NEIGHBORHOOD,  SYDNEY AUSTRALIA. SUNDAY.

 

The letter that had landed in her mailbox that fine Sunday morning looked like a normal, average, every day kind of letter. It was even addressed to her, Kara Masters, and was affixed with three cents more postage then what was strictly necessary for incountry mailings.

 

The only problem was Kara Masters did not in fact know anyone who would be sending her hand addressed and stamped letters. Kara didn’t didn’t exist, and Katy was very concerned. The last time she’d had a cover recieve a letter, it’d been a warning from their now deceased handler that the op had been blown. That letter had self incerinerated after thirty seconds. It’d actually been pretty cool.

 

This one sadly did not self incinerate. Instead, in a neat ambiguous handwriting, it chattered on about ridiculous organic fruit prices and a recent musical production in Seattle that might be coming on tour. It closed with an invitation to tea on Monday.

 

It was signed, Love, Uncle Phil. There was no return address.

 

 

ORIGINAL BACKPACKERS HOSTEL, KINGS CROSS, SYDNEY.

 

The worn napkin neatly folded into a bueaitufl origami swan by her bed, was from some cafe downtown. On it, a smeared unreadable phone number, and scrawled beside it “SEE YOU AT THREE, <3 MEL.”. 

 

When Laura had gone to sleep, her door had been locked, with a chair pushed under it, and no convenient window entry. The origami napkin swan had not been there the night before.

 

 

Laura and Katy, miles apart, both reached for their throwing knives, engraved in the base of the hilt with the symbol of a tiny, flying eagle surrounded by rays of sun.

 

It was time to go home.

 

 

 

 

 

 

THE END.

 

_You don’t brush your hair if you're not going anywhere_

_and I can’t stand the noise when we’re staying up all night_

_spinning round the house in circles splashing promises on wood_

_and I wonder._

_and I wonder_

_is this going anywhere do you have love I can spare_

_is this all just me in a dress and your eyes in a stare_

_and I wonder._

_and I wonder_

_will you dance with me at christmas hold my hand by the tree_

_will you breakdown and cry with me when I scrap a knee?_

_is this all really just pointless did we get lost in the woods_

_well I don’t know anymore but I wish that I could._

_You see the closer we get the harder it is too see_

_if this really is you or just another part of me_

_this is what we’ve become slowly winding undone_

_left standing on the edge at the rise of the sun_

_and I wonder._

_and I wonder_

_Is this enough for you are you enough for me_

_Can I be a better women the way that you believe_

_Is this change for the best I can’t tell any more_

_all I know is that I want it to be your face at my door._

**Author's Note:**

> All of the poetry fragments are parts of my other pieces of work, which you can access on my blog, myownknight.tumblr.com


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